The Age Structure-Crime Rate Relationship: Solving a Long-Standing Puzzle

Objectives

Develop the concept of differential institutional engagement and test its ability to explain discrepant findings regarding the relationship between the age structure and homicide rates across ecological studies of crime. We hypothesize that differential degrees of institutional engagement—youths with ties to mainstream social institutions such as school, work or the military on one end of the spectrum and youths without such bonds on the other end—account for the direction of the relationship between homicide rates and age structure (high crime prone ages, such as 15–29).

Methods

Cross sectional, Ordinary Least Squares regression analyses using robust standard errors are conducted using large samples of cities characterized by varying degrees of youths’ differential institutional engagement for the years 1980, 1990 and 2000. The concept is operationalized with the percent of the population enrolled in college and the percent of 16–19 year olds who are simultaneously not enrolled in school, not in the labor market (not in the labor force or unemployed), and not in the military.

Results

Consistent and invariant results emerged. Positive effects of age structure on homicide rates are found in cities that have high percentages of disengaged youth and negative effects are found among cities characterized with high percentages of youth participating in mainstream social institutions.

Conclusions

This conceptualization of differential institutional engagement explains the discrepant findings in prior studies, and the findings demonstrate the influence of these contextual effects and the nature of the age structure-crime relationship.     

Finding Politics in Cinema: The Portuguese Democratic Transition

Taking into account the political and social transformations initiated by the 1974 April revolution and the process of democratic transition, this article analyzes the political context and issues registered in documentary films in the period 1974–76. In their own way, documentary films carried a certain cultural praxis and social memory through the variety of symbols, beliefs, values, attitudes, and discourses that lay within these documentaries, allowing us to evaluate the dynamics of both power and legitimacy implicit in political culture. This article will focus on the cultural and political implications of documentary films on political theory in regards to the Portuguese democratic transition.     

Governance Interventions in Conflict-Affected Countries

This paper reviews an emerging body of literature on governance interventions in countries with ongoing violent conflict, recovering from conflict or at risk of conflict. The review focusses on three broad intervention areas. The first includes interventions that support local governance and the improvement of local capacity for collective action. The second area comprises interventions that strengthen the accountability, legitimacy, and reach of state institutions, including the improvement of information and the provision of public goods. The third centres on interventions aimed at changing social norms that shape systems of governance. Ways forward for future research and policy are proposed.     

Management Quality and State Bond Ratings: Exploring the Links between Public Management and Fiscal Outcomes

How and when does management matter for government performance? Focusing on the quality of core management systems, this study proposes that one way management contributes to government effectiveness is by facilitating access to low-cost credit. However, whether well-managed systems have greater access to low-cost debt compared to poorly managed organizations depends in part on prevailing conditions in the external environment. The study tests these propositions in the context of state governments' general obligation bond ratings. Results from the pooled Tobit models show that states with higher-quality management systems are rewarded with higher bond ratings. However, the positive effects of management on bond ratings are attenuated when the economy deteriorates or political uncertainties increase.     

Predicting Deliberative Conversation: The Impact of Discussion Networks,Media Use,and Political Cognitions

This study explores the meaning and origins of deliberative political conversation, characterized by an openness to political conflict, the absence of conversational dominance, clear and reasonable argument, and mutual comprehension. Adapting McLeod, Scheufele, and Moy's (1999) McLeod, J. M., Scheufele, D. A. and Moy, P. 1999. Community, communication, and participation: The role of mass media and interpersonal discussion in local political participation. Political Communication, 16: 315–336. [CSA][CROSSREF][Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar] model of democratic engagement, we posit a series of relationships among discussion networks, media use, political cognition, and public participation. Using two divergent samples—one consisting of 149 adult literacy students and another comprising 130 public forum participants—we test the model's utility as a predictor of deliberative conversation. Structural equation modeling indicates that network characteristics had mixed effects. Print media use and interpersonal discussion tended to enhance deliberative conversation, and television news viewing hindered both the reasonableness of one's arguments and the comprehension of others' views. Taken together, these results suggest that the deliberative quality of public talk has a complex relationship with common predictors of other political communication behavior.     

Prevalence and blood concentrations of benzodiazepines and opioids in opioid-positive death investigations in Ontario,Canada, from 2017 to 2021

The aim of this study was to investigate the incidence of benzodiazepines in opioid-positive death investigations, including trends in frequency and combination of drugs, as well as demographic data and blood concentrations, where available. Additionally, naloxone concentrations in polysubstance compared to opioid-only cases were analyzed. This was a retrospective study that consisted of all post-mortem toxicology cases in Ontario, Canada, from January 01, 2017, to December 31, 2021, with an opioid finding in any analyzed autopsy specimen. There were 11,033 death investigations identified. The overall rate of benzodiazepine co-involvement was 54.5%. Males accounted for the majority of cases (71%), and the most affected age group was 30- to 39-year-olds. The most frequently detected opioid was fentanyl and the most frequently detected benzodiazepine was etizolam, which was also the most frequently observed opioid/benzodiazepine combination. Findings related to differences in concentrations of opioids when naloxone was also present were mostly non-significant, except for methadone. The rate of benzodiazepine detection with opioids grew faster than opioid detections overall, potentially due to the increasingly toxic drug supply. Detection of novel psychoactive drugs fluctuated more unpredictably than opioids and benzodiazepines associated with clinical use. These findings can help inform policy decisions by public health agencies in exploring harm reduction efforts, for example, education and drug-checking services.     

Sino‐French relations: Historical alliance vs. economic reality

Abstract

In an increasingly integrated international economy, nation-states are, of themselves, no longer the prime containers or coordinators of political–economic activity. The extra-territoriality of states and the blurring of the boundaries between states and firms, for example, have been captured in analytical concepts such as ‘triangular diplomacy’ the ‘web of global interdependencies’ and ‘cosmopolitan democracy’. Such trends have become visible in what have been termed mega-urban regions or zones of economic integration or of graduated sovereignty. Moreover, such zones are held to illustrate non-traditional or cooperative inter-state relations. This paper utilizes Stopford and Strange's (1991) Stopford, J. and Strange, S. 1991. Rival States, Rival Firms: Competition for World Market Shares, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar] notion of ‘triangular diplomacy’ to interpret the development of one such zone – the Indonesia–Malaysia–Singapore growth triangle (IMS-GT). The paper argues that whilst embodying elements of cooperative inter-state relations the development of the IMS-GT also highlights the persistence of the ‘traditional’ concerns of inter-state relations. It also uses the notion of triangular diplomacy to draw attention to different models of social order sought by multinational enterprises (MNEs).